SUNY Oswego music faculty member and concert pianist Robert Auler has joined forces with composer and friend Jonathan Pieslak to publish “Shards,” a collection of piano solos featuring widely divergent influences. Auler, who has taught at Oswego for 11 years — and whose global performance career added China and South Africa in just the last year — met Pieslak in graduate school at the University of Michigan.
Global Greeter Network, www.globalgreeternetwork.info, is a wonderful way to find a free person-to-person tour. Greeters are volunteers who love their city so much they volunteer to give free two-hour tours. They take visitors to parks, shopping, or lesser known neighborhoods. Greeters are not professional guides, so greeters do not take their guests to museums leaving that to professional guides.
CNY Arts Center’s production of Romeo and Juliet opens this weekend. The Shakespearean classic runs August 15-17 and 22-24 with Friday and Saturday performances at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m.
What will an actor do to give you, the audience, a memorable experience? Maybe better to ask ‘What won’t an actor do?’ It all looks so easy right? CNY Arts Center actors are digging for answers to this question in rehearsal for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet set to open Friday at 8 p.m. and run through August 24 at 3 p.m.
Why does a chicken cross the road? To get a part in an Oswego Players’ production of Jack Sharkey’s farce, “Who’s on First?” of course. A rubber chicken, not a real chicken and a talking magic lamp are essential characters in the upcoming production directed by Sherri Metz. The play is set to open in mid-September.
I admit it, I am a museophile. Big or small, art or history, I enjoy all museums, but I favor the small museum. They are usually devoted to one topic so that I can learn all I need to know in an hour or so plus they usually are started by someone with a passion for the item. When John and I were in Nebraska we visited several such museums. The Kregel Windmill Company in Nebraska City was a windmill factory that was turned into a museum. Touch screens facilitate the self-guided tour.
Romeo and Juliet, played by Knate MacKenzie Roy and Nikki Bolio, rehearse an early scene in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The play opens August 15 at CNY Arts Center, 357 State St. The all-star cast features well-known actors from the areas three theatre companies in key roles as well as blind-gender casting with women playing male roles as modern day strong women.
Several years ago, when we were in Honduras, John and I stopped to see a new luxury ecolodge outside of La Ceiba called Las Cascada Lodge. I fell in love with it. It is nestled in the rainforest surrounded by trees and flowers. The rooms, there are only three of them, have a view of the jungle waterfalls. There are several cascading falls each with a small pool at the bottom that is big enough to swim in.
The area around Trujillo, Honduras, is being promoted as the Banana Coast which is much more marketable than the area just to the east called The Mosquito Coast. However, the name “mosquito’ refers to the Native Americans who lived in the area not the insect of which there are many. Trujillo is an interesting place. It is where Christopher Columbus first stepped foot on the mainland of the Americas and where O. Henry hid out while a fugitive from justice.
Romeo’s Juliet asks “What’s in a name?” and when it comes to Shakespeare, mixed response quickly follows from grimace to enthusiasm. Ask an actor that question and the challenge quickly becomes irresistible. But for local theatre companies, balancing audience appeal with actor enthusiasm is not always easy.
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